July 25th 2016

Breakfast was potatoes and rice, ate the potatoes, skipped the rice. Didn’t
sleep that well and I am counting the days left in the tent. (6)

I always feel like we don’t get that much done while we are here. The days
are so short and I seem to fall asleep so early. This is likely due to the
poor sleeping conditions. The other Mark snores so loud that I can’t
imagine how a spouse could handle it. One of the drivers also snores but he
is a bit farther away. Aron has a chronic cough that will go on for an hour
when he first lays down and sometimes during the night. The humidity still
bothers me at night, it was cool enough in the 60s, but I always feel
sticky. Washing your face would make it feel better, but the water isn’t
clean so that isn’t a good Idea so I used a baby wipe instead.

The jungle noises aren’t bad except if you count the chickens that start up
at 3:30am. There are rats everywhere, but they are more like big mice and
you do hear them on the roofs and in the walls. I have seen several of them
within 5 to 10 feet or so. There were some in the wall last night while we
were working.

The more I think about problems here the more I feel they are not the
technical ones. Getting the locals to take ownership of the systems after
installation seems to be a big problem. It seems they would rather wait
until we come back to fix the problems than just fix them. They have
individuals that are sharp enough to do it. Some of it is a money problem,
nobody wants to pay taxes.

The food has improved somewhat but I think I still will loose a few pounds.
Not much dairy either. Breakfast this morning was fried potato slices on
rice. I followed that up with a granola bar. Was going to take a shower
last night, but decided to wait until this afternoon. Too many spiders in
the showers to do that at night. The views at night are something I wish
you could see. The moon is way passed full, but you can see very well by
it. Even with a bit of fog in the air, you can see one of the mountains in
the distance with the fog in the valley, all by moonlight. When it clears a
bit, the stars are hard to describe.

There is as always dirt everywhere. Hard to keep anything clean. I have
worn the same pants throughout the trip so far and might just wash the legs
this afternoon if the sun is strong.

We have meetings at 3 of the schools today, I don’t think we will get any
actual work done.

First two meetings went ok, at the second one, they wanted to run an inverter.

Lunch was carrots, beans, and rice. I was hungry so I ate it all. Meeting
at 2:00 was a school that is on the low end of the poverty side. They get
lights next year. Back at Kafs. Swella attempted to get a gram of river
gold, but they didn’t have any. I took a shower and texted with Antje.
Washed just the legs of the pants.